Snowmaking Begins at Lake Tahoe Resorts

In the dead of night, a snow gun fires at Northstar... (Courtesy: Northstar)

Get your wax ready and find that missing glove. Ski season is only a few weeks away.

How do we know? A number of resorts have begun to make snow. While it doesn’t compare to the first major dump of the season, this is a key juncture in the preseason. Kind of like pitchers and catchers reporting for Spring Training.

If the temperatures stay low, and Mother Nature provides a little help, two of Tahoe’s bigger resorts — Heavenly and Northstar — plan to open by Friday, Nov. 18.

Even if there isn’t a lot of natural snow, Heavenly stands to open on time. The resort can cover 73 percent of its trails in machine-made snow. It can produce three-and-a-half feet of snow over one acre in an hour. That’s enough snow to blanket a football field with eight-and-a-half feet during an average three-hour game.
By comparison, Northstar can cover 50 percent of its trails in machine-made snow — which isn’t bad, either.

“It’s always exciting when temperatures cooperate and we’re able to fire up the snowmaking system for the first time of the season,” said Bill Rock, vice president and chief operating officer of Northstar California Resort.

It’s more exciting when the real stuff starts flying.

In the meantime, give this video a look. Super cool footage of today’s snowmaking efforts at Heavenly: